Twenty six killed in Mexico, rivals blame cartel in massacre

Thirteen were reported killed or found dead on 3 April, these including five bodies found in a burned car in the north-central state of Zacatecas, and two dismembered bodies found in the district of Fuerte in the north-western state of Sinaloa. The 13 also included two bodies with torture marks found in the northern city of Tijuana and, unusually, a driver shot to death from another car in the Colonia Roma, a middle-class neighbourhood of Mexico City, Proceso reported. The bodies of four youngsters including a 13-year-old were found on 4 April by a road in the northern state of Chihuahua, La Crónica de Hoy and other dailies reported. The victims, shot to death, were respectively aged 13,18, 22 and 29, Proceso reported. Three bodies were found on 5 April in a clandestine grave outside the Pacific resort of Acapulco following information given to police by a suspected kidnapper detained on 3 April, Milenio reported. The detainee reportedly confessed to police his involvement in the undated killing of a local schoolteacher and schoolgirl, and possibly other kidnappings and murders in Acapulco and the Guerrero state, which were being investigated. The daily also reported: a 16-year-old schoolgirl was found dead near Mitla in Oaxaca on 5 April, a week after she was reported disappeared and with signs she had likely been beaten, raped and stabbed, while a man was shot dead while driving in the town of Tonalá in Chiapas, southern Mexico. Four were also reported shot dead in incidents on 5 April in the western state of Jalisco, El Informador reported. A local politician may have been kidnapped in his house in the state of Zacatecas on 2 April, although the suspected crime was not reported for days. Jaime Rincón, a mayoral pre-candidate of the Green Party for the district of Cañitas de Felipe Pescador remained absent and police stated nobody had yet called to ask for a ransom, Proceso reported on 5 April. Authorities identified the nine dismembered bodies found on 31 March outside the north-eastern city of Victoria as belonging to migrants heading north to process permits to enter the United States, following information given by their relatives. Their discovery apparently prompted Mexico's Sinaloa cartel to accuse the rival Zetas cartel of having murdered the nine, the charge being written on sheets (narcomantas) briefly found hanging in the northern city of Nuevo Laredo before police took them down, Proceso reported on 4 April. The message attributed to the Sinaloa cartel chief Joaquín Guzmán Loera was addressed to the "sick" Zetas chief Z40 and "corrupt authorities" allegedly protecting him, and vowed to help the Gulf Cartel "cleanse" Nuevo Laredo of Zetas.

Policemen among 25 or more killed around Mexico

More than 25 were reported shot or found dead in Mexico over 19-21 February, including a child and several policemen, in killings likely related to crime and drugs, while authorities were looking for four policemen missing in the western state of Jalisco. On 20 February the review Proceso reported the shooting deaths of five in the northern city of Monterrey. In the western state of Guerrero that day, armed residents or the self-styled community police shot dead a suspected criminal and arrested another in the district of Tecoanapa; this may have been the first time the militia shot a criminal since these were formed in January. The residents confiscated four shotguns and burned crops in a small marijuana field the suspects were presumably guarding, Proceso reported. The review counted 18 people killed around the country that day although it was not immediately clear if this included the five reported shot dead in Monterrey; the 18 did include a family of four including an 11-year-old, gunned down in Monterrey after leaving the funeral of a friend or relative who had also been shot. Other victims of the day were two brothers and US nationals found dead in an abandoned petrol station the north-western district of Mexicali, tied with tape and apparently beaten and shot, Proceso reported. On 21 February two policemen were found shot dead in their car in the district of Chimalhuacán outside Mexico City; while four policemen of the district of Jilotlán de los Dolores in Jalisco were reported missing on 20 or 21 February. They were called to investigate a body said found in a nearby spot called El Terrero, but were missing when state investigators later arrived there, Proceso reported. Authorities were looking for them. Also on 21 February: two peasants were ambushed and shot in the countryside outside Atlixtac in Guerrero, while five policemen were shot or found dead in diferent incidents in Gómez Palacio and Lerdo in the northern state of Durango, Milenio reported. The Defence Ministry separately confirmed the deaths of two pilots in a plane crash in Estado de México, north of the capital on 21 Feburary; authorities were investigating its causes, Milenio reported.

Forty killed in violence around Mexico

At least 40 were reported killed or found dead in violent incidents around Mexico on 24-28 January, including armed criminals, cartel operatives, policemen and eight folk singers who were apparently "tortured" then shot. Six victims were reported as gunned down in the central state of Hidalgo on 25-26 January in two killings police provisionally attributed to the cartel Caballeros Templarios, Proceso reported. The review reported 11 killings in several states on 24-25 January, including of a policeman shot while eating by a food stall and a member of the Sinaloa drug cartel. The gangster was killed by municipal police during response to a car theft in Juárez in the northern state of Chihuahua; he was identified as number 11 in the cartel's hierarchy, Proceso reported on 25 January. The policeman was identified as police chief of the village of Tlajomulco de Zúñiga in the western state of Jalisco. Five at least were reported shot dead on 26 January in or near the districts of Ocampo and Ciudad Juárez in Chihuahua. One was a 19-year-old gunman killed by soldiers during an attempted highway robbery and another a policeman of Ciudad Juárez, Proceso reported. Seven suspected criminals were killed on 25 or 26 January as gunmen in cars traded fire on the road between Magdalena and Tequila in the western state of Jalisco, Proceso reported, citing Notimex. Troops shot dead three presumed gangsters early on 27 January, apparently responding to firing from a house in Fresnillo in the north-central state of Zacatecas; the patrol had arrived after authorities received calls there were armed men in the house. The bodies of eight members of the musical group Kombo Kolombia kidnapped days before were found on 28 January on an estate in the district of Mina in the northern state of Nuevo León; The group, whose members were numbered in reports at 16 or 20, was thought to have been kidnapped on the night of 24-25 January in the nearby district of Hidalgo as it prepared to play a concert, Milenio reported on 28 January.

Thirteen killed around Mexico, six found in pieces

Thirteen people were reported killed or found dead on 24 January in criminal executions and shootouts with police around Mexico. Six of these were found dismembered in 15 plastic bags left in a car in the city of Toluca in the State of Mexico, a day after five bodies were found there in similar conditions, Proceso reported. A message was left apparently addressed to the authorities, and reportedly signed by one of the cartels the Familia Michoacana. Other victims included: two suspected drug dealers shot in a gun fight with police in the west-coast resort of Acapulco, and a police officer from the western district of Quitupan, shot by gangsters who pursued his car on a road near the frontier between the states of Jalisco and Michoacán. Separately the northern districts of Gómez Palacio and Lerdo were apparently without preventive or uniformed policemen after 81 resigned following their temporary detention and interrogation over suspected ties to criminals, CNN reported on 24 January, citing declarations by the Prosecutor's office of the state of Durango wherein are the districts. Other media had reported 91 resignations; this was in any case for the policemen's refusal to sit confidence or probity tests and undergo re-training ordered by the chief prosecutor of Durango, Sonia de la Garza. Nine policemen agreed to sit the tests, CNNMéxico reported.

Dozens killed around Mexico, head left at mayor's house

Twenty six or more people were reported killed or found dead in the states of Jalisco, Michoacán, Zacatecas and Sinaloa on 23-24 December in criminal executions and gun battles, these including a dozen policemen shot dead by gangsters, Proceso and El Universal reported. In one incident, three policemen were shot dead in Ayotlán in Jalisco, in a gun fight with 40 armed men who drove into town in a caravan of 10 cars; the gang had earlier fired on police in nearby Degollado, with no fatalities. Nine policemen from the district of Briseñas in Michoacán were killed in that state on the night of 23-24 December, as their patrol came under fire from criminals, El Universal reported. It counted 11 victims of crime in Michoacán that night. It separately reported that six people were shot or found dead on 23 December in the districts Cósala and Culiacán in the north-western state of Sinaloa. A man was shot dead on 23 December in the north-central city of Zacatecas, El Universal reported the police as saying. In the northern city of Torreón, five dismembered bodies were found at the back of a car late on 21 December, Proceso reported on 22 December, citing the local daily Vanguardia. An unspecified message was found by the bodies. A 25-year-old woman was killed in the north-western city of Chihuahua as she sought to protect her four-year-old child from shooting between a suspect and police, Proceso reported. She was driving by the spot where a man began shooting from his car at a Federal police car. On 22 December, a severed head was left at the entrance of a house belonging to the mayor of El Arenal in the western state of Jalisco, with a message from a criminal gang, Proceso reported, citing the weblog narco.com. The mayor, Alejandro Ocampo Aldana, is a member of the Institutional Revolutionary Party and began working in October; the head belonged to a man reported kidnapped on 20 December in the village of Huaxtla. The message was signed by the Alianza de sangre empresa NX (Blood Alliance Enterprise NX) and directed at drug cartels competing in this area The Zetas, the Jalisco Nueva Generación and a gang called Los Sandoval, Proceso reported.

Crime violence continues as Mexico changes leaders

Mexico's presidential transition was no excuse for organized crime to interrupt its activities, and about 20 were reported shot dead or found dead between 28 November and 1 December. Ten "at least" were reported killed on 28-29 November, apparently in addition to those reported earlier as killed on 28 November; victims included the police chief of the locality of Cocula in the western state of Guerrero and a colleague, "executed by gunmen" late on 28 November, Proceso reported on 30 November. Two policemen were gunned down on 30 November in Tlajomulco de Zúñiga, south of the western city of Guadalajara. On 1 December, five bodies were reported found around the north-central city of Zacatecas with messages from the Gulf Cartel to their rivals The Zetas. These stated that the executions were because The Zetas had not taken up "the opportunity" their rivals had given them to abandon the area, Proceso reported on 1 December. Four policemen were also killed or found dead in and around the northern city of Torreón on 30 November or early on 1 December, the state government of Coahuila announced. Another recently reported crime was the killing of a 14-year-old "bike-taxi" driver in the state of Morelos south of the capital, for unexplained motives. The teenager, named Miguel Ángel, drove passengers on a vehicle consisting of a passenger seat pulled by a motorbike; apparently stoned to death, he was found on 27 November in the locality of Xoxocotla where he lived, near his burned vehicle, Milenio reported on 28 November.

Ten reported killed around Mexico

Gunmen shot dead on 30 October the district Public Security or police chief of San Martín de Hidalgo in the western state of Jalisco, a week after a similar attack on a local police chief, Proceso reported. Eight assassins reportedly arrived in a Dodge truck at seven in the morning and forcibly entered the home of Casimiro Zárate Guerrero; the weekly reported an attack on 22 October on the police chief of Guadalupe, a nearby district within the Valles zone west of the city of Guadalajara. He and two colleagues were shot dead in that attack by individuals riding four "luxury" estate cars, presumaly members of a drug cartel. Also on 30 October, marines shot dead five suspected kidnappers in the Cosamaloapan district of the the east-coast state of Veracruz, as they sought to rescue a hostage, Proceso reported. A gun battle erupted when marines entered the roadside Villa Paraíso hotel looking for the son of a local notary reportedly held there; the kidnappers threw hand grenades at them. The judiciary in the neighbouring state of Tabasco separately presented to media on 30 October three suspected kidnappers arrested on 26 October and presumed members of a gang active in the states of Tabasco and Chiapas, Proceso reported. Four people were also reported shot dead that day: three men in Tonalá next to Guadalajara and a Honduran migrant in the state of Veracruz, Proceso reported.

Eight reported killed around Mexico

"At least" eight people were killed in violent incidents in four states of Mexico on 9 October, including a 16-year-old girl gunned down from a car in the northern city of Torreón, Proceso reported that day. Another victim was a 75-year-old man apparently strangled to death in the north-western town of Santiago Papasquiaro. Suspected criminals separately burned 20 police cars and confiscated vehicles in a police parking in Fresnillo in the north-central state of Zacatecas, Proceso reported on 9 October.

Over 20 killed around Mexico

Seventeen corpses were found half naked and chained together in western Mexico on 16 September, the result of a mass execution authorities suspected was perpetrated in another state, Mexico's El Informador reported on 17 September. The victims had apparently been shot; police and troops found them "piled up" by the road linking the districts of Tizapán el Alto and Cojumatlán de Régules on the border of the states of Jalisco and Michoacán. An unnamed female resident of Tizapán told El Informador it was now difficult to walk around Tizapán at night "for fear of being shot," and more police were needed. She said "it is known or the authorities know that Tizapán" was being been fought over by two local cartels the Caballeros Templarios and Jalisco Nueva Generación. Also on 16 September, five people were shot to death in different parts of the western resort of Acapulco, El Universal reported on 17 September. On 13 September, four taxi drivers and a woman were shot dead in two incidents in Monterrey, northern Mexico, Spain's EFE reported that day. The drivers were shot at close range by suspected gangsters; the woman was apparently killed by a stray bullet, the agency stated.